


A Certain Flexibility

by Kithri



Series: Flames-verse [3]
Category: Chronicles of Amber - Roger Zelazny, The Good Wife (TV)
Genre: And then Kalinda turns into a black panther, Animate hair, Aural sex, F/F, Hair bondage, Orgasmically photosynthetic, Plant sex, Porn with character development, Purring, Rampant abuse of Advanced Shapeshifting, Sex with multiple copies, Shapeshifter sex, Telepathic Sex, This all makes sense in context, Zero-gravity sex, honestly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-28
Updated: 2013-07-28
Packaged: 2017-12-21 13:53:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/901054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kithri/pseuds/Kithri
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alicia and Kalinda take their relationship to the next level. And a few beyond that.</p><p>Set in the Flames-verse, after both Flames of a Different Hue and Breakfast with Florimel.</p><p>Written for <a href="http://sweetjamielee.livejournal.com/99615.html#comments">Sweetjamielee's The "Plan B" Summer 2013 TGW Ficathon</a> Prompt: Alicia / Kalinda – shapeshifting sex</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Certain Flexibility

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Français available: [Une certaine flexibilité](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1128009) by [hotladykisses](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hotladykisses/pseuds/hotladykisses)



> This story strikes us as a potentially hilarious generator of tags. If anyone has any more suggestions, please leave them as a comment.

I unbind her hair, slowly sliding free one pin after the other until it spills over her skin in ebony waves. It's longer than I expected; heavier. I can't help running my hands through it, thrilling in the way it slips through my fingers like silk. (And maybe it's my imagination, maybe it isn't, but I can almost believe that her hair curls around my fingers in turn, returning the caress.)

She makes a soft sound, part purr, part moan, arching her back a little like a cat. Her eyes are like cat's eyes, hooded and dark. Lids half-closed like that, she should look lazy, sleepy. Instead, she watches me like she's ready to pounce. I can sense the leashed strength in her muscles and sinews as she uncoils into a stretch, still keeping her eyes on mine. One side of her mouth twitches upwards in that characteristic half-smile of hers; as familiar as it is mysterious.

Part of me -- the part of me that's on the lookout for threats every minute of every hour of every day of my life -- tenses, whispering uneasily of danger.

If I'm honest (and if I can't be honest in the privacy of my own mind, then when?), that whisper only makes me want this all the more.

In the space between one heartbeat and the next, she goes from stretching languidly beneath my hands, to twining herself around me, brushing her lips over mine before trailing a line of kisses down my neck.

I tell myself that my small, sharp gasp is all down to her lips, her teeth; her nimble fingers unfastening one button after another so that my blouse falls open. The slow, deliberate way she teases the bared skin with feather-light brushes of her fingertips.

I tell myself that, but I don't believe it.

From the glint in her eyes, she doesn't either.

Well and good. My own hands and mouth aren't exactly idle, and by the time we stand naked before each other, our clothes scattered on the floor at our feet, perhaps we both seem a little short of breath.

I look at her for a long moment, letting my gaze travel over her body, drinking in the smooth, dusky skin, the lithe muscles, the gentle curve of her hips and breasts. She looks completely human.

But, of course, she's more than that. So much more. And, the desire almost startling me with its suddenness, its intensity, I realise that I want it all.

All of her.

I kiss her hard and fast, pulling her to me with all of my strength (and isn't it wonderful to be able to do that and not hold back; to know that she won't break in my arms), thrilling as she meets and matches my passion and my strength alike.

"I've changed my mind," I say, gasping out the words between kisses.

"What?" She stiffens, starting to pull back a little, but I pursue her, keeping her close.

"What we said? About taking it slow? I don't want that after all. I want to leap in, all the way." My voice cracks a little, so for a moment I barely even recognise it. "I want to know you as you are, Kalinda. As you really are."

This time when she pulls back, I let her, meeting her searching gaze as openly as I can.

"Alicia, are you sure?" she asks, her tone carefully neutral. Not pushing, not asking *for* anything, just asking a simple question.

Yes," I say simply. And then, because whatever else I may be, I am after all my father's daughter, I add somewhat tartly: "You're not the only one who's flexible."

And she's not the only shapeshifter I've been with. (Even if none my other Chaosian lovers had nearly the same level of skill at changing form that she does. Without that skill... Let's just say that the results are by no means guaranteed.)

She laughs a little at my response. "Well then," she murmurs, her voice low and amused. "Let's see just how flexible you are..."

 

This time, I'm certain of it: her hair is moving of its own accord, twining its way around me and lightly brushing my skin. I can't help pulling back a little to watch. (And if my eyes are a little wide, then I'm sure that just reflects my distant, fascinated speculations regarding musculature and co-ordination.)

"Is this alright?" she asks.

"Yes," I say. "It just... I didn't know you could do that. I- oh!"

The feather-light caress reaches my breasts, making me shiver and gasp as it flows over my already-sensitive nipples, closing around them like suckling mouths.

"I can do a great many things," she murmurs.

I believe her.

I'm not entirely certain how we make it to the bed, but when I can focus beyond my skin, she's stretched out above me, an almost vulnerable look on her face as she brushes my hair out of my eyes.

"If we're going to do this, I want to do it properly," she says, softly. "I want to learn you. I want to learn how to pleasure you with everything that I am, everything that I can do. And I want the only thing on your mind to be how good you feel."

I start to ask what she means, but then I feel the light pressure at my wrists and ankles as the silken strands of her hair coil about my limbs before loosening again.

"You want to bind me with your hair?" I ask, just to make sure we're on the same page.

"Yes."

Again, there's that flutter in my stomach, warning me that here lies danger. But I bite back my instinctive refusal and make myself actually think about the question. About what she's really asking.

She's asking me to trust her.

And it isn't that I don't. It isn't even as though this is our first time together. I wouldn't *be* here with her, like this, if I didn't still trust her, even after everything that's happened between then and now.

But...

But.

To cover up my hesitation, I lift my head and kiss her, cupping her breasts with my hands, delighting in the way she quivers when my thumbs brush her nipples. (She always has been sensitive, but it only now occurs to me to wonder how much of that is natural, and how much is choice.)

"What if I want to learn you?" I ask, teasingly, sliding one hand down her belly so that my fingers rest lightly between her thighs.

She laughs at that, which makes me frown a little, but I'm a somewhat mollified by the breathlessness of the sound.

"Then we'll be here a long time."

I smile against her lips. "I think I can handle that."

"Alicia..." She sighs softly, and I wonder what arguments she's going to marshal, what logical-seeming points she's going to make. But in the end, all she says is: "Please."

The simplicity of it goes right through me, shattering my half-formed objections.

"Yes," I reply.

Because, when it comes down to it, I do trust her.

I do.

Once more, her hair coils around my wrists and ankles, slowly tightening, slowly drawing my limbs apart until I'm spread-eagled beneath her on the bed. She leans in close, surprising me by brushing her lips over my forehead, my eyelids, my cheeks, my lips; a gentle rain of kisses.

"If you don't feel comfortable, or if you want me to stop at any point, let me know."

"I will." I give her a lopsided grin. "You know I'm not shy about speaking my mind when it's important."

No matter how reserved I might be otherwise.

She starts to move down my body, trailing light kisses over my skin. I tilt my head to watch her, and she smiles as her eyes meet mine. Slowly, deliberately, she opens her mouth and touches the tip of her tongue to the valley between my breasts. I blink a little when I realise that her tongue is somewhat longer than usual. And forked. And... apparently rather prehensile.

Oh! The possibilities...

I moan a little as she curls that wondrous tongue around first one erect nipple, and then the other, torn between conflicting desires. Part of me wants to urge her to linger where she is a while, to keep doing those things that make my skin tingle and my breath catch in my throat. The rest of me -- a growing part -- wants to demand that she hurry southward right away, to where the moist heat of desire pulses between my legs.

Before I can struggle to put my need into words, she continues moving downwards, still restricting her touch to those feather-light brushes of lips and tongue across my skin. My vocal chords aren't co-operating at the moment, but I can't help arching my back a little, impatient for more. For her long, slim, dextrous fingers. But she shakes her head slowly, amusement glinting in her eyes, and I feel the bindings tighten a little at my wrists and ankles, reminding me that she has me at her mercy.

I make myself relax.

It isn't easy.

But she rewards me by pressing her lips into the curve of my belly, and trailing kisses downwards until she's kneeling between my legs. I feel the bindings at my ankles flow up over my calves and curl around my thighs, gently pressing them further apart. Her tongue flicks out, making my breath hitch in my throat, making me tense in anticipation, but instead of touching me where I need it, crave it, she laps at my inner thighs.

"You're teasing me," I accuse, panting as she laves my taut, sensitive skin with deft little flicks of her tongue.

"Learning you," she corrects.

I start to protest, but she flicks her tongue across my clitoris and whatever I was going to say dissolves into a low moan.

"You seem to like that," she whispers softly, as I tremble beneath her. "But I'd better make sure..."

And then her tongue is on me again, flicking back and forth with the gentlest of touches, so gentle that I almost, almost, tell her 'harder,' but then I pass a threshold. Suddenly, the pressure is building within me, slowly but inexorably, carrying me higher and higher and *higher*, until I don't think I can take any more...

Until I break, crying out as the climax shudders through my body.

Kalinda raises her head, looking down at me with a satisfied smirk.

"Was that good for you?"

I nod, then manage to find my voice. "Yes," I say, then gasp as her hands cup my breasts, gently squeezing and caressing them. There's something strange about the sensation, almost like... like her palms are suckling at my nipples.

Strange... but definitely not unpleasant.

I frown a little, tilting my head, trying to see, but of course her hands are in the way.

"Is this alright?" she asks, softly.

"Yes," I say, giving her a smile that turns into biting my lip as she does something particularly delicious. "Just... Just wondering how you're doing that."

For a moment, her face is an unreadable mask, but then she gives a lopsided smile, lifting one hand from my skin (and I can't help sighing a little as its loss) to show me the palm. Instead of the expected (normal?) smooth skin, it's covered with thin, raised ridges of... muscle? The ridges undulate slightly as I watch, making me think of gills and creatures of the deep.

"Still alright?" she asks.

My eyes are perhaps a little wide, but I nod my head. "Yes," I say. "I just... You can change the texture of your skin?"

She nods, slowly. "And I can consciously control every part of my body if I want to, down to the cellular level."

As if to emphasise her point, her hair whispers over my skin, pressing against nerve clusters and pressure points I didn't even know I had, leaving me trembling with aftershocks, like fireworks are exploding beneath my skin.

"Oh!" I say, the word more of a gasp than a coherent word. "That has... possibilities."

Probabilities, even.

"Enough talking," Kalinda murmurs. She lowers her hand again, and I arch my back as it feels like her palms are vibrating gently against my breasts. "Just... enjoy." It feels like a lightning bolt goes through me, a pulse of sensation arcing from my breasts to my groin. My eyes half-close, and then fly open in startlement as I realise that's not just a phantom sensation.

I look down, for a moment thinking I'm seeing double, but then I realise that she now has four arms. Four hands. Four incredibly dextrous, flexible and talented hands.

"Kalinda?" I gasp, not quite able to articulate my question.

She arches one eyebrow quizzically, stilling her movements but not withdrawing, leaving me with that tantalising hint of pressure just where I'm most sensitive.

"Is this okay?" she asks, softly.

"Yes," I say, nodding emphatically. "It just took me by surprise, that's all."

Although I don't know why it would, really. I've studied shapeshifters. I know the kinds of things they're capable of, and I know Kalinda is talented. But I haven't really thought of them in the context of the bedroom before.

(Peter always remained in human form whenever he was with me. 'As a courtesy,' he said. 'Fear of losing control of his shifting,' my unkind self whispers. My kinder part wonders why I never told him he didn't have to be so... courteous? No, I know why. What I had with him was more than a business partnership, but less than an affair of the heart; a nebulous middle ground between feelings and convenience.)

(And neither one of us ever said a thing about trust.)

"There'll be more of those before we're done," breathes Kalinda.

And I can't help thinking that her words sound like a promise.

But then she's moving again, caressing my breasts, stroking the warm, slick flesh between my legs, exploring my body with her own. She's playing me like an instrument, bringing me to heights I've never reached before, and I can't... can't *think* any longer.

All I can do is feel.

And it feels...

So...

Good.

 

...really *are* cat's eyes, amber-rimmed and slit-pupilled and hungry as she watches me writhe. In the dim light, they seem to glow like they're on fire, and I'm on fire I'm burning for her burning with sensation, so much sensation I-

 

Eyes and ears closed, taste and smell muffled, not even certain which way is up. The only sense she allows me now is touch, but I've never felt more aware, more alive. My nerves are hypersensitive, alert, the slightest stimulus sending shocks arcing through my body. And she makes me wait for every morsel of sensation, teasing me, testing me, drawing it out and out until... finally...

...trembling with the force of it, shaking almost fit to fall apart, writhing in paroxysms of ecstasy and-

I think I might be screaming.

(I think I might be screaming her name.)

 

She gives me back my senses one by one, reminding me that a world exists beyond the borders of my skin. She is my horizon, my border, my boundary. Paradoxically, although she contains and constrains me so completely, I feel like she's setting me free.

Free to feel (without second-guessing myself), free to experience (without analysing every last detail). Free (to yield)...

Free from everything except...

(The never-ending roar of the Vortex deep within me; a hunger that can never be sated, never satisfied, only endured. I can barely even remember what I was without it, before dearest Aunt Fiona turned me into a weapon to end all weapons. A weapon to end everything. And the Vortex wants to. Oh, it wants to. But I won't let that happen. My will is stronger than its hunger. I will not set it free.)

(But I can still feel it howling.)

(Always.)

(Even now.)

...pleasure.

 

-floating beyond the stars, cradled by her, surrounded by her, penetrated by her, breathing her into my darkest depths. Melting, merging, so I hardly know where my flesh ends and hers begins. Barriers becoming malleable, mutable, and it feels only natural to reach out with my mind, offering to bridge the last remaining space between us.

I taste the sweet-sharpness of her shock as she accepts, know she wasn't expecting me to offer this, even before she starts groping for words, her thoughts wavering between honey-warm pleasure, and thin, cold spikes of unease.

"I wasn't going to ask-"

"I know." I smile with all my being, letting her glimpse my clear, calm certainty, like sunlight on a winter's day, unclouded by regrets or fear. "I trust you."

She snorts, and her amusement is like cinnamon sea spray, sharp and refreshing.

"You can crush my mind like a grape, you mean." For a moment, there's a queasy undercurrent to her words; wariness, maybe even fear, but then those ripples melt away into a glasslike smoothness. I think...

I think she trusts me too.

But I don't want to prod at that, not yet. (Not until and unless she tells me herself, in words.) So instead I keep my thoughts frothy and light.

"That too," I say serenely. "Anyway, it's only fair, given your advantages in the physical arena." 

"I'm glad you approve," she all-but purrs, and I don't have to be in her mind to sense the heat in those words. I shiver in her arms.

And for how long has she even *had* arms again?

I realise that I'm not cocooned by her any longer, that I'm standing, not sprawled on the bed, that she's coalesced (retreated?) into human shape. More or less human, at any rate. I drink in the sight of her: large amber eyes (not a bliss-induced hallucination, then) and small, delicately-pointed horns curving up from just behind her ears. Her legs are jointed strangely, so that she balances on the balls of her feet, weight slightly forward as if she's perpetually ready to leap.

Her whole body is covered in a delicate, barely visible tracery of lines and whorls, the same shade as her eyes. When it catches the light, it stands out against her dusky skin, giving her a scaled appearance. The tendrils of her hair -- shorter now that earlier, but still reaching down to her waist at least -- float around her as if she's underwater, waving gently in the non-existent breeze.

She's beautiful.

As that thought crystallises into coherence, bands of colour ripple over the surface of Kalinda's mind like light refracted through a soap bubble. She's pleased, and... relieved. And other things that I don't delve into.

"You're beautiful too," she whispers.

I've always known I was attractive (and Aunt Florimel made certain I learned how to use that as both weapon and shield), but Kalinda's words, so free from her usual guardedness, light me up like a sunrise.

Even so, I can't help saying, teasingly: "You mean, you don't find my single form dull compared to all the variety that Chaos has to offer?"

She returns my arch expression with a level gaze. "No."

Wordless, I reach out and draw her in for a kiss, which she returns with enthusiasm.

"I have an idea," she says in my mind. (At times like these, there are definite advantages to using mind-speech rather the more conventional kind.)

"Oh?"

She doesn't answer right away, and curiosity almost tempts me to delve beneath the surface of the deep, dark ocean that is her mind, to see what she's going to ask. (Or if she's changed her mind.) But she does, eventually speak again.

"It isn't just my own body I can change."

Oh. *Oh*.

Curiosity wars with terror wars with a hot rush of desire.

I can honestly say no one's ever suggested that to me before. I'd heard that the most skilled shifters can do that, but, again, I hadn't really considered applications outside of combat and espionage.

"How would you change me?" I ask, cautiously.

Her amusement sparkles like sunlight on water.

"Let's not spoil the surprise," she drawls. More seriously, she adds: "It would only be temporary."

I must admit I'm tempted. I dither for a moment or two -- long enough that she's starting to say it doesn't matter -- and then suddenly, impulsively say: "Alright."

That surprises her, I can tell. Maybe her suggestion was just as impulsive as my acceptance.

"You're sure?"

"Yes." I give her a smile. "I'm curious now."

And I trust her.

"Okay, then," she says, aloud. "Tell me if you want to stop at any point, and I'll change you back right away."

"I will."

(Anyway, my psychic combat skills are formidable enough that, if I want her to stop, I'm confident that I could make her. I mean, I do trust her. I do. But the habits of a lifetime are hard to break and the best kind of trust, my instincts assure me, is the kind that isn't necessary.)

Kalinda kisses me lightly on the lips, the surface of her mind rippling and extruding tendrils. They move slowly, as she gives me every opportunity to change my decision.

I don't.

(Even if, deep inside me where she can't hear it, my instincts are screaming at me to mount a defence. I remind them that this isn't an attack.)

"Relax," she tells me, her voice low and hypnotic.

I do my best, going through some meditation exercises as she insinuates her mind into my flesh.

It tickles a little at first, a wave of goosebumps prickling over my skin before vanishing as suddenly as they appeared. Muscles tense and relax without my command. I feel a little dizzy for a moment.

"What are you doing?" I ask mentally, as my mouth babbles nonsense sounds without me.

"Learning you."

I frown, or try to. I think my eyebrows are trying to signal in semaphore.

"Wasn't that what you were doing earlier?"

"This is deeper." That seems to be the only explanation she intends to offer me, but before I can marshal a coherent list of questions, she adds: "Finished."

"Oh." That was... fast? Actually, I have no idea. How long should it take to figure out what makes a princess of Amber tick? (Physically, at least. I'm not that *anyone's* qualified to figure out the twists and turns of my mental landscape. Possibly not even me.) "So, what now?"

"Now..." She takes a step back, a slow, wicked smile spreading across her face. "We'll start with something simple..."

My legs start moving of their own accord, taking me to the bed where my body settles itself down on the mattress. I wait for a moment or two, wondering what she's going to do with me, but all she does is move a little so she can see me better. I stretch experimentally, a little surprised -- and somewhat relieved -- when I actually can.

This is... strange. I can still feel my body, and it still *seems* to respond normally, but I'm constantly aware of Kalinda's silent presence inside me, of the fact that she could take control at any moment.

(At least, for as long as I allow it.)

She could make me do... anything she wants.

(Within reason.)

So what is she waiting for?

I meet her gaze.

"Are you just going to stand there and watch me?" I ask.

She tilts her head. "Watch, yes." She leans forward a little, anticipation sparking behind her eyes. "Just, no."

My hands rise up to settle lightly on my skin, one sliding up to cup my breast, while the other moves downwards, between my legs. I gasp as my hands, my fingers, move expertly, finding just the right spots, just the right rhythm and pressure.

My head turns, just a little, so I can look into Kalinda's eyes, feeling an almost physical shock when our gazes connect. For a dizzying moment, I see myself through her eyes, writhing and panting as she caresses me with my own hands.

"What... What about you?" I ask.

She raises an eyebrow. "What *about* me?" she asks.

I'm sure she knows full well what I mean, but I struggle to put it into words, gasping the words out as my breath gets increasingly erratic.

"I want to pleasure you. I- ah! I want to make *you* feel this good."

"After," she says, her voice smoky and dark. "This part is all about you."

"It doesn't have to be..."

I'm getting close now, and I don't have time or patience for *words*, so I show her what I mean. Just the lightest pressure; offering, not grasping, so she can push it away if she chooses. I honestly don't know whether she'll accept, but then her eyes open wide and I'm...

The connection between us...

...so close now...

...deepens, broadens, and...

I'm right on the edge, and...

...we climax together, waves of pleasure flooding through the channel of our shared senses, resonating between us, fierce currents sweeping us away...

Until the tide recedes, leaving us to settle slowly back to earth once more.

I come back to awareness to find Kalinda sprawled across me, panting a little as she looks down at me with wide-eyes.

Her throat works for a moment, and then she says: "Oh. That has..."

"Possibilities?" I finish, my voice low and husky.

"Yeah." She smiles, and I feel my flesh start to ripple and change as she once more extends the threads of her will. "Possibilities..."

 

We float together in the zero-gravity bubble; me above, her below. I watch her, watching me, her expression uncharacteristically open, even vulnerable, her mind a comfortable weight against mine. We don't physically touch. We don't need to. I'm so sensitive right now that even the slightest breeze on my skin is almost enough to bring me to orgasm.

As that thought crosses my mind, Kalinda's lips stretch in a slow smile. Her hair fans out around her body like a cloak, strands merging and fanning out, spreading into membranous shapes like the wings of a manta ray. She undulates them gently, and I have a moment to wonder what she's doing before the air whispers over my skin and I'm lost to thought once again.

We both cry out together.

 

...hear sounds I've never heard before, every single note going straight to my core, as she sings me to a crescendo and-

 

-sugar-rush as light hits the photosynthetic cells in my epidermis; a burst of energy thrumming along my nerves so that my whole body seems to be vibrating. My sense-buds wave in the air, savouring Kalinda's spicy-sharp musk, the scent sending a hot wave of desire coursing through my veins. Her own need, her own desire, crashes into my mind and I reach out with my vine-limbs, tangling them with hers. We press our seed-buds together, each contact sending tiny shocks through my body. Our scents mingle and merge, and the world dissolves into light...

 

-caught between two bodies, both of them Kalinda. They speak with one voice, move with one mind, acting with a synchronicity that no two separate beings can ever manage. One of her presses her breasts against my back, wrapping her arms around my middle as she bends her neck to kiss my lips. The other of her kneels before me, also bending to kiss me...

 

"Let me show you," I whisper, and she acquiesces wordlessly, opening to me in a way I never could have dreamed. I weave a net of connections, a jewel-strung spider's web floating on the surface of her mind, plucking the glittering strands like the strings of a harp. A symphony of sensation played in the vault of her mind and echoed in the corridors of mine.

 

...and finally, withdrawal. Fixed in form and separate in mind, we kiss and caress each other, human hands on human skin, lips and teeth and tongues and slickness and heat and ecstasy and...

(Love?)

...joy.

 

Afterwards, after who knows how long of undoing and being undone by her, we lay together on the bed, tangled in each other's arms. I feel spent and satisfied. Completely and utterly sated.

At this moment, I think I could quite happily never move again.

Kalinda is watching me through heavy-lidded eyes, a sleepy half-smile on her lips.

Well, maybe I can move a little bit.

I lean forward a little and lightly press my lips to hers, running my fingers through her wonderful hair. She makes a low rumbling sound that is so much like a cat's purr that I have to chuckle a little.

She arches an eyebrow.

"What's so funny?"

"Nothing really," I say, kissing her again. She just looks at me. "You just remind me of a cat sometimes, that's all. Like... right now."

"Do I?" she drawls.

I stroke her hair again, running my fingers down her back for good measure. She arches and purrs, making me grin.

"Yes. Yes, you do."

"Well, in that case..."

She pulls away a little, and I briefly, irrationally, worry that I've offended her. But she gives me a look that's amused, tolerant and even fond. She stretches a little, doing nothing to dispel my impression of felinity, and then her skin ripples. Fur starts sprouting from her back, a wave of it rushing to cover her body like the tide rushing in to cover the shore. Her joints twist and bend and her whole body changes shape before my eyes. By the time she's done, instead of a mostly-human seeming woman stretched out on the bed next to me, there's now a large, black-furred, panther-like... cat.

Her eyes, though, are exactly the same. And the wickedly amused glint in them, well, that's pure Kalinda.

"You're a cat," I find myself saying, somewhat inanely.

She makes a coughing noise in her throat. Laughter, I realise. She's laughing at me. I narrow my eyes at her, and she stops. Butting my hand with her head, she looks at me expectantly. Imperiously, almost.

Just like a cat.

"What, you want me to pet you?"

Slowly, deliberately, she nods her head. A thousand and one possible responses come to mind, but in the end, I roll my eyes and start stroking her back, combing my fingers through her thick, glossy fur.

Kalinda purrs.

Of course, she does.

And, maybe it's because she can't talk right now, because maybe if I close my eyes I could almost pretend that she really is a cat, that she can't understand human speech. But I find myself leaning over and whispering into her fur.

"I love you."

She turns to look at me, her eyes wide and searching and all too human, and then she leans her head lightly against mine.

And purrs.


End file.
